Evaluation

The 'Intentions' project began with the holiday brief - to draw our summer. I traveled Thailand in march so I took inspiration form my travels around the beautiful, tropical country.  I mostly began to look at drawing the decayed tiles of the Grand Palace and the fresh flowers i saw around the city of Bangkok. My theme future/past is reflected in a lot of my inspiration; ancient buildings with the new fresh flowers. The sources create a contrast.

I drew many motifs as I wasn't too sure what was meant be 'drawings', so when I attended the drawing workshop, I understood this also meant mark marking and creating texture. So from there continued to work on these textured drawings. I also took some more inspiration from the city of manchester by visiting China town and viewing the ornate arch.

I began to crate a few of my first few digital designs during a cite cloud workshop using the motif I have drawn previously. At the time I believed they were really incredible, however; compared to my facial designs, these ones are quite static and still.

I needed to contextualise my work before i continued making empty designs with no meaning. I researched trends for spring/summer 17 on WGSN. This is a very important resource to see future trends in fashion, textiles, interiors etc. I came across two interesting trends that suited my initial sources and my market demographic - tropical iridescence and beachcomber. The tropical iridescence trend is slightly dark colors with highlights of neons and vibrant colors. The visuals are of tropical foliage and flowers and is inspired by cuban art and imagery. The beachcomber trend is compiled of batik and hand dyed visuals and inspired by surf and sea. to interpret these trends I experimented with tie dye which I used in the background of my further prints and candle batik - however this was unsuccessful. 

After a tutorial it was suggested I started using more texture in the background of my digital designs. this will give a richer outcome to them so I experimented with tie dyes and shibori techniques. Then scanned them into the mac and worked onto them digitally. Doing this has reinforcedthe future/ast theme back into my work because tie dye and shire are older techniques which i have fixed with digital design - thus a contrast between future and past has been created. 

Continuing to develop my designs I decided to experiment with foils and flocking also which I believe was very successful and have used in my final deigns. I really liked how the gold and bronze foils made the topical prints even more so iridescent. This technique also made them a lot more marketable looking and suited o my market of shops like Motel Rocks, Zara and Topshop. Initially i printed a few of my samples onto silk, however given the market i am  designed for silk may be a bit too pricey so would suggest they would be printed on something similar like a georgette rayon -  light fabric that is synthetic and more economic than silk - it is also vegan friendly.

During my Project i found myself struggling with insomnia and anxiety and because if this I missed a lot of studio time. Unfortunately I did not get to physically print anything via screen due to my sleeping pattern, if i were to have the opportunity to redo this project i would hopefully been able to screen print as i do enjoy it. I also would have enjoyed using techniques such a procion and manutex printing. I would also crate a time line to complete weekly tasks to keep on top of my workload. this may also be very motivating when the tasks are complete each week.

I have six final outcomes which i am quite pleased with and are all digitally designed (due to the previously mentioned) i feel they could be sold for fashion to the markets and brands i was working towards because they are on trend for ss17, are young and fresh looking designs and are very summery visuals. Designing digitally and using photoshop want  new technique to me, however using more texture in my backgrounds for my designs was and i feel it was a good leap into the right direction for my future designs. I also had never digitally printed onto fabric so that was a new and exciting technique for me to look at and continue to work with in future.

Current Print Designs

I have been working digitally to design prints for this project, i have mostly found myself working on tropical florals. this was spurred by the 'iridescent tropicals' trend for SS17 and inspired from my thai travels.

For this design i used he hibiscus drawings and also a few lea drawings from a previous project at college that i still had saved in a layer bank. 

i feel this print is effective because if fits the design requirements and would suit the market i am working towards. It fits the beachcomber trend for SS!& and the tropical trend also.

I have developed this design further into black and white. From that, i shall use the print to apply heat transfer dyes to, from there i use the print ton fabric. This technique will give the effect of digital printing, but with a more hand made feel and also is quick and easy to reproduce on a small scale.

Also this week, i printed my previous designs onto silk using digital printing. this is a new technique for me and i was quite excited to see the results. Once i hd collected my silk digital prints from the studio; inspired by the trend, i decided to add some foils to them to enhance the iridescence vibe. i found that this was really effective on the darker prints and also worked really well with the bronze foil. i will take this forward to my final designs and i feel they were very effective, fitted the design brief, theme and market. i decided to scrape the foiling glue on vertically as i have been working with this vertical image idea throughout my project, this was inspired by the long tiles of the grand palace.